Harming the monitor?

Ranger4 said:

whs said:

How about having all lights in the house lit all the time, having the car(s) running all the time in idle, running any device that consumes power all the time - at least you will enjoy a hefty electricity bill.

I come from a country where energy costs 3 to 5 times as much as in the US so I am a bit sensitive to the matter. The energy prices in the US are very low so people will never learn to save. You can only get them by the pocket book.

I agree, leaving your computer on 24/7 is just plainly wasting money if you are not using it. Who leaves their TV on 24 hours a day if they are not watching it?.

Booting time for a computer with a SSD is about 30 seconds, from power on so surely the saving in time there is negligible.

Also any electrical appliance that is running unattended is a potential fire risk, so leaving it going while you are asleep in bed at night, has lethal potential.

I shut my computer down when I have finished using it & I turn off any power to it as well.

Different people have different needs, work flows, etc. Your situation isn't any more typical than mine is so you can't assume everyone's situation is going to be the same as yours (or mine). I've already stated why my computer needs to stay on 24/7, including the fact (and why) it takes one heck of a lot longer than 30 seconds to boot Win 7 despite having an excellent SSD.

Your statement about any electrical appliance that is running unattended being a potential fire risk is ludicrous. Do you also turn off and unplug your refrigerator, AC, furnace (even a gas, oil, or coal furnace uses electricity), computer router and/or modem, all night lights, fans, etc.? Do you unplug your microwave, stove (even gas stoves now draw electricity at all times), DVD or Blu-ray player, DVR, and other similar appliances that still draw current even though turned off? Do you not charge up your cell phone while your asleep for fear it might catch fire? Actually, that is more likely to happen (and has been known to happen) than a computer catching fire. For that matter, you should turn off your cell phone when not using it and keep it in a fire proof safe because the lithium ion batteries have been known to spontaneously combust.

If you use your computer briefly once or twice a day, yes, it definitely would make sense to turn it off after using it. However, not everyone uses their computer that way. There are people who use their computers for more than just checking their social media, email, and, maybe, forums. Day traders who work out of their homes need their computers running 24/7 (and have large numbers of monitors also running 24/7). For that matter, many others who work out of their homes need their computers for hours at a time, often half a day or more. Many people use their computers for distributed computing (look up Folding@Home or protein and gene folding if you don't know what distributed computing is). For various legitimate reasons, some people's only telephone connection is via VOIP and, unless they want to drop out of sight for much of the day, they need to keep their computers running 24/7. Many newer homes are now "connected" (the so-called Internet of Things) and that requires a computer running 24/7.

The point is neither you nor anyone else can dictate how long others should run their computers, especially when based on your or their own usage patterns.

hazel m said:

In all due respect, folks, we are not talking about the CPU. It stays on until I shut it down for the night. We are talking about the monitor - leaving it on all the time - until I shut down for the night. I cannot allow it to go into power-saving mode while ESET is scanning. I was getting conflicting answers about just setting it at never.

Screen savers (as someone mentioned) were great. I had them on my two previous computers but do not have any on this one. Instead I have a scene from a friend's home town which was sent to me. So the monitor sits there with that picture whenever I close what I'm working on until I open something else. The other way - setting it at a time - has it sometimes closing when I am sitting here reading a long article and not moving anything. I guess that inactivity makes it think - do robots think? - it is inactive.

A closing consideration is that my computer really is in action much of the day. I am seldom away from it more than five or ten minutes from the time I boot up of a morning and shut down late afternoon.

Thank you all for ideas.

The picture you described sounds like a wallpaper—a background for the desktop—not a screensaver. A screensaver is a picture that changes or moves around so the monitor doesn't get burned in by a constant image. These date back to the CRT monitors which didn't take long to get an image burned into them. Modern LCDs are pretty much burn in proof but it's still possible for it to happen if given enough time.

To set up a basic screen saver, check out one of the tutorials here.

If you want to prevent Burn-in on a monitor or to save electricity one way is as follows ...

Set the screensaver to "Blank Screen" , (this switches the monitor screen off so that it only consumes a minimum power, and does not have the ability to cause burn in.

If you set the automatic timer to a fairly long time, (EG 15 Minutes), it should not cause the screen to go off whilst reading a page.

When you decide t leave the computer simply press WIN+L which immediately locks the system and starts the screen saver, Although this will mean that if you have a password, this will need to be entered when you return to the computer, this extra security is a good thing as it stops little fingers, (work colleagues, spouses, & children), from messing things up

hazel m said:

Thank you for the lead. Yes, I meant to say I knew screen savers were constantly moving. Does that mean I'd have to get rid of my "wall paper" scene?

Nope, you can have both. The screensaver starts up only after the computer has been idle for an amount of time you can specify. I personally haven't used a screen saver in years since I can turn off my monitors when I'm not using them but I understand that your situation is different.

LF, If your PC takes a lot longer than 30 seconds booting from a SSD, then something is wrong and that should be separately investigated.